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Suella Braverman says she will not apologize for her language after a Holocaust survivor told the Home Secretary that her description of migrants as an “invasion” was similar to the rhetoric used by the Nazis to justify killing her family .
Ms Braverman faced Joan Salter, 83, at a meeting in her constituency of Fareham in Hampshire on Friday night.
Ms Salter, who received an MBE for her work on Holocaust education, likened Ms Braverman’s rhetoric about migrants trying to cross the Channel to that used by the Nazis during the Second World War.
When I hear you use anti-refugee words like “swarms” and “invasion” I am reminded of the language used to dehumanize and justify the killing of my family and millions of others
Joan Salter, Holocaust survivor
In footage of the exchange released by the charity Freedom From Torture, Ms Salter said: “I am a child survivor of the Holocaust.
“In 1943 I was forced to flee my birthplace in Belgium and made my way through war-torn Europe and dangerous seas until I finally made it to the UK in 1947.
“When I hear you use anti-refugee words like ‘swarms’ and ‘invasion’ I am reminded of the language used to dehumanize and justify the killing of my family and millions of others.
“Why do you feel you have to use such language?”
Ms Braverman thanked Ms Salter for her question and said she “shared enormous concern and sympathy” about the “challenge” of illegal immigration, adding that her own parents were not born in Britain.
Speaking about her parents, Ms Braverman said: “They owe everything to this country and taught me a deep and profound love for Britain and the British people.
“Their tolerance, generosity, decency, fair play.
“It also means we shouldn’t shy away from saying there’s a problem.
I will make no apologies for the language I used to demonstrate the magnitude of the problem.
Suella Braverman, Secretary of the Interior
“There’s a huge problem we have right now when it comes to illegal migration, the scale of which we didn’t know before.
“I will not apologize for the language I used to demonstrate the scale of the problem.
“I see my job as honest with the British people and honest for the British people.
“I will not run from the hard truths, nor will I hide what the reality is that we all observe.”
Ms Braverman added that she was “incredibly proud” of the UK’s recent immigration record, but added that “we have a problem with people exploiting our generosity, breaking our laws and undermining our system”.
“We have to accept the enormity of the problem if we’re going to have any chance of solving it,” she said.
Ms. Braverman’s response was met with applause from the audience.
Born Fanny Zimetbaum in Brussels in 1940 to Polish Jews, Ms. Salter was three months old when Belgium was invaded by the Nazis.
After the invasion, she fled to France with her mother and sister before being taken by the Red Cross to the US in 1943.
Mrs. Salter remained in foster care in America until she was reunited with her parents in 1947 in London, where she has since lived.
Less than a week into her tenure as Home Secretary under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Ms Braverman referred to her work as “stopping the invasion of our south coast”.
She previously held the post under Liz Truss from September 6 until October 19, when she resigned for breaching the ministerial code by sharing an official document from her personal email address.
The Home Office said the shortened version of the video showing Ms Braverman’s response to the Fareham event should be removed from social media because it “misrepresents the interaction”.
A department spokesman said: “The Home Secretary attended an event last night and answered questions, including about immigration policy.
“Footnotes of a conversation with a Holocaust survivor are circulating online. The video is heavily edited and does not reflect the full exchange.
“The Minister of the Interior listened carefully to the testimony. She thanks her for sharing her story.
“The Home Secretary also expressed his sympathy and outlined why it is important to tackle illegal migration.
“Because the footage misrepresents the interaction regarding a sensitive area of politics, we have asked the organization that posted the video to take it down.”
Ms Braverman did not use the word “swarm”, but it has been used by prominent politicians including former Prime Minister David Cameron and former UK Independence Party (Ukip) leader Nigel Farage.
In July 2015, Mr Cameron told journalists that “swarms of people” were “coming across the Mediterranean in search of a better life”.
In the same month, Mr Farage said in an interview with ITV that he was “stuck on the motorway and surrounded by swarms of would-be migrants” who were “trying the back door of the car to see if they could get in”.
He later backtracked, saying in an interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today program that he had not “used that kind of language” when asked if he would talk about “swarms” of migrants.
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